Anchor BanCorp completes $175M recapitalization

Anchor BanCorp Wisconsin Inc. has completed its $175 million recapitalization, it said Friday in a news release.

The previously announced recapitalization comes after a Chapter 11 reorganization package for the bank was approved Aug. 30.

The new capital gives Anchor BanCorp’s subsidiary, AnchorBank, one of the highest capital ratios of Wisconsin banks, president and CEO Chris Bauer said in the release.

“We have been aggressively working for four years to get to this point, and we’re proud that the recapitalization effort is now complete, positioning AnchorBank for a full return to profitability and growth,” Bauer said in the release.

Anchor BanCorp filed for Chapter 11 on Aug. 13 after several years of losses and collapsing stock value. Under the plan, Madison-based Anchor will pay U.S. Bank, Bank of America and Associated Bank $49 million to pay off an $186 million debt. It will also give the U.S. Treasury a 3.3 percent equity stake in the reorganized company, worth about $6 million, to cancel a $139 million debt through the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP.

Previously held shares of the company, which had fallen to 42 cents per share before the deal was announced, have been canceled.

In an earlier interview, Bauer said the company planned to register the stock of the reorganized company with the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission within 90 days of closing the recapitalization, allowing it to be bought and sold. The Treasury plans to immediately sell its equity, he said at the time.